Ravenwild: Book 01 - Ravenwild (14 page)

“Nobody’s blaming anybody here,” Jessica continued the argument. “But despite everything we know, which isn’t much, this could be dangerous, and if, heaven forbid, anything were to happen to us, then … well …” her voice trailed off as she was unable to take the thought to its logical conclusion.

There was another brief silence.

Hemlock interrupted it. “How soon will it be before Kendra gets here? The reason I ask is we should be on our way as soon as possible.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” said Jessica. The look on her face was one of dark anger. “Is there a problem?”

Hemlock remained unfazed. He repeated his question.

“An hour,” she snapped. “They’ll be fine until she gets here. Now take us to our daughter. Orie, come give me a hug. You too, Jacq’. Come now. Spit-spot. We have to go get Stephanie. Then we’re coming straight back. And I’ll tell you right now, it’s going to take a lot of convincing to get this family to help you on whatever quest, or journey, or whatever it is you need from us.” Her face was a rock as she finished.

Hugs were exchanged all around by the Strong family while Hemlock wisely moved back to give them their space.

Orie, none too pleased with the unilateral decision to be excluded from the adventure, nevertheless kept quiet about his displeasure. “A little too quiet,” thought Jessica, as she strapped on all manner of weapons and survival gear.

“Wow, Mom, Dad, I can't remember the last time I saw you both wearing your swords at the same time,” said Orie. “You look wicked cool.”

“Are we ready?” asked Hemlock.

Blake and Jessica nodded. The face of each was a mask of non-emotion. Jessica barely got out, “I love you,” when they were gone.

“C’mon Jacqueline,” said Orie. The tone of his voice was urgent. “Follow me.” He raced down the stairs and mounted his bike. Jacqueline did the same.

Quietly, he said, “Let’s go. Stay close to me. Keep your eyes peeled for anyone or anything that’s normally not here.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Exactly what I said. Stay as close to me as you can, and watch out for anybody. If you see somebody, tell me immediately. Immediately. Or anything strange.”

“How will I know if I see something strange? What am I looking for?”

Orie shoved off and called back, “Trust me, you’ll know it if you see it.”

They raced down the driveway at warp speed and squealed to a halt in front of the barn. Orie threw his bike down and ran up inside. He grabbed two fishing poles and a net, and raced back to his bike.

“Hey, if we’re going fishing, I have to turn the horses out first,” said Jacqueline. He leaned over to her and whispered in her ear. “We’re not going fishing. Do what I said, and follow me. We’ll be right back. The horses can wait.”

Off they pedaled up the driveway. Getting to the first rise, they took off down a walking trail that belonged to their neighbor, Ron, in the direction of his ponds, with Jacqueline grilling him all the way about what they were doing and why.

In a few minutes they were at the edge of a field. It was about fifty yards across. Behind it was a patch of woods about 30 feet deep, beyond which the land jutted straight upwards in a series of cliffs and overhangs for about 450 feet. It was on these cliffs that Orie had learned to rappel. He had stopped shy of the near edge of the field where they still had the cover of the woods. He hauled his bike up and off the trail, into the trees and bramble, squatting down low. Jacqueline followed suit. She opened her mouth to speak, but he put his finger to his lips and flashed her the danger sign. He leaned in and whispered, “See those pumpkins?”

She nodded, “Yes.”

“Hemlock put something in one of them just before he came up to the house. I saw him sneaking down this way, so I cut around the trail up by elephant rock and waited for him. Sure enough, in a minute, he came walking down the trail. He looked all around and waited for quite a while before he did it. It’s almost like he was checking to see if somebody was watching him or something, like he might have even known I was watching, but I don’t think he ever saw me. Anyway, we need to see what’s in it.”

“So why don’t you just go over and look?” she whispered back. She gave him a look that said, “What’s the big deal?”

“I don’t know,” he said softly. “I was thinking Hemlock believed somebody might be watching him. We should wait and see. Most importantly we need to listen. Like when we go hunting. Dad always says you should keep your eyes open, but mostly you need to keep your ears open. I picked this side because the wind is towards us.”

She crossed her arms and gave him a look of disgust. “I hate your hunting,” she muttered, and looked away.

They sat and waited.

The minutes ticked away as they stayed totally silent and hidden in the dense New England woods.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” Jacqueline whispered after about twenty minutes.

Orie leaned over to whisper to her to hold it, when they both heard a stick snap. No mistaking it, there was something in the woods beyond the pumpkins in front of the cliffs.

They waited. Jacqueline wiggled closer to her brother who put his arm around her protectively. She practically burrowed herself into him.

For a long time they heard nothing, then, once again, they heard the unmistakable sounds of something big moving in the woods beyond the field, and it sounded to Orie as if it was trying to move quietly.

Then they saw it as it eased out of its cover. It was nothing like either of them had ever seen, except maybe in a fantasy movie. It had the extremities and torso of a man, including two arms and two legs. But it had the head and neck of a bull, complete with a set of vicious-looking horns. It was easily seven feet tall, maybe more. Orie’s eyes grew wide as it looked in their direction and raised its snout to sniff at the air. Jacqueline buried her face in her brother’s chest. For the longest time it stared at where they were hidden, and Orie thought they were doomed, but all of a sudden it drifted back into the woods beyond, and they could hear it move up the trail heading in the direction of Ron’s house. Again they waited, but only long enough for it to be out of earshot, and Orie whispered, “C’mon. We gotta get out of here. It might be trying to work its way behind us.”

She reached for her bicycle. Orie shook his head forcefully, “No.” He leaned towards her and whispered, “Too much noise. Follow me. Quiet, now.”

Silently, they snuck away from their temporary hiding place and partway down the trail back towards the house but, when they came to a fork, Orie went right, away from their property.

“This is the trail that Dad cut with the chainsaw,” he said softly. Jacqueline was now trembling violently. He noticed this and again put his arm around her. “We can’t go back towards the house. That’s not an option. That thing might be there, or headed there. We have to get out to the road and head off Kendra. We have to warn her. Are you okay?”

She nodded, “Yes. It was a Minotaur,” she said.

“Okay. Are you ready to run?”

She nodded, “Yes,” again.

They walked quietly, “woods quiet,” Dad would have called it, down the right hand fork of the trail for about another hundred yards, then Orie said, “Jacq’, let’s jet out of here. You lead, I’ll follow.”

And so they ran, like the wind, Jacqueline’s hair streaming out behind her. It was an uneventful dash of about half a mile. They stopped shy of the macadam road on which they lived. They were both breathing as hard as they could, Jacqueline holding her side.

When their breathing had quieted down, Orie spoke first. “I never thought I’d be happy that our driveway is a half-mile long, but right now, I’m glad that there’s a half-mile in between us and that … what did you say it was?”

“A Minotaur,” she answered. “It was a Greek god that was half-man and half-bull. It was mean. Very mean. It will kill us if it can.” She was trembling again.

“Well then, we’ll have to be smarter than it is.” He took her in his arms and gave her a big long hug. She started to cry. “Hey, hey,” he said. “It’ll be all right. Kendra will be here in a few minutes, and we’ll go with her and be fine. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”

She stopped crying and wiped her eyes. “Not against
that
you won’t.”

In a few minutes, a car whizzed by them from the other direction. They paid it no mind, as it was not coming from the direction that Tanta Kendra would be, but suddenly Orie cried out, “Oh crap. That’s Mr. Jones. He’s got Mark and Ryan and Jordan with him.”

The car turned into their driveway and disappeared around the first bend before Orie could call out to them.

“Great,” he said. “Now what do we do?”

He was torn in two. On the one hand, he was feeling the most afraid that he had ever felt in his life,
and
he felt a fierce determination to protect his little sister. On the other, he knew he had to warn Mr. Jones and his three friends. That Minotaur thing, or whatever it was, was something they had to be warned about.

“C’mon,” he said, “follow me.”

“Where are we going?” Jacqueline asked.

“To John’s house,” said Orie. “I’ll call Mark on his cell phone and tell him to get out of there. Can you run?”

“I guess so,” said Jacqueline, although her legs were about done running after their half-mile sprint through the woods.

So, down the driveway they ran, but were surprised when Mr. Jones’s car came flying up the driveway so fast they practically had to jump off to avoid being hit. It stopped, and Mark rolled the window down.

“Orie, wazzup?” he offered, all smiles. “Hi, Jacqueline.”

“Wow,” said Orie. “Did you see it? The Minotaurus?”

“Minotaur,” corrected Jacqueline.

“What’s a Minotaur?” asked Mark.

“I
told
you that already, Mark,” said Mr. Jones. “Don’t you ever listen?”

“Oh,” said Mark, “You mean that guy that was waiting for you on your deck with the costume on? The guy that looked like a half-man half-bull? Man, he looked pretty crazy.”

“Yeah
he did,” said Ryan.

Orie and Jacqueline looked at each other.

“Open up and let us in,” said Orie.

“We can’t do that,” said Mr. Jones. “We don’t have enough seat belts.”

“Please, Mr. Jones,” said Orie, “this is an emergency. Give us a ride to the end of Gungy. We need to intercept my Aunt Kendra. She’s coming to pick us up.”

“Okay,” said Mr. Jones, “but you’ll have to all duck down when we go by Officer Corey’s house. I don’t want to get a ticket for having too many kids in my car and not enough seat belts.”

Orie jammed into the front and Jacqueline in the back.

“So what’s up with that guy waiting for you at the house?” asked Jordan.

“Man, that was some freak-show of a dude …”

“I know,” interrupted Mark. “That was the most realistic costume I’ve ever seen. I was like, whoa, check out this half-man, half-bull dude. This guy rocks!”

“And did you see how strong he was?” asked Ryan. “That guy was buffed. And he seemed real nice too.”

“You spoke to him?” asked Orie, incredulous.

“Of course we did,” said Mr. Jones. “We asked him where you were. He told us you and Jacqueline had gone up in the woods about a half-hour ago, and he was waiting to surprise your mother. What was he, one of those singing telegram guys?”

Neither Orie nor Jacqueline commented, prompting Mr. Jones to ask, “So how come you have to meet your Aunt Kendra, Orie? Why can’t you wait for her at home?”

Orie thought for a moment, and Jacqueline answered, “It’s a long story, Mr. Jones. Tanta Kendra can’t see this man. I don’t think we’re supposed to talk about it.”

“Oh,” said Mr. Jones, looking perplexed, and thankfully let it rest with no more explanation than that.

“Hey,” called out Orie. “There she is! Mr. Jones, stop the car.”

Orie and Jacqueline bolted out of the car and flagged Kendra down.

She got out as well and exchanged pleasantries with Mr. Jones and the boys, while giving Jacqueline a big hug.

“Tanta,” said Orie, “I’m going to go with Mr. Jones and these guys, if that’s okay, and Jacqueline is going to go with you.”

“Sure,” said Kendra. “Does your mother know?”

Orie and Jacqueline exchanged glances. Neither spoke.

“Well, that’s no problem. I’ll call her on her cell.”

“It won’t work,” said Orie, “I mean, I’m sure she’s out of range.”

“Oh. Well, I’m sure it’s all right, if it’s all right with you, Nash.”

“Fine.”

“All right then. Do you have your stuff, Jacqueline?”

Jacqueline turned red and didn’t answer for a while.

“That’s all right, we’ll drive over to the house and get it.”

“You can’t do that,” said Orie.

“Goodness gracious, why not?”

“ 'Cause there’s some guy at the house that you’re not supposed to see.”

“Now Orie, whatever does
that
mean?” she asked. “This is all very strange, very strange. Your mother called me an hour ago and told me I had to come right down, that something urgent had come up. Where’s Stephanie?”